Okay okay Leo Mckern Number Two’s character development :’)))))))
He seems like he’s always felt conflicted about this role right back to "Chimes" when he acknowledges that he and Six are both lifers and attempts to rationalize the Village’s existence:
There's also a cut scene where he chides someone for referring to him as "sir", as though he's trying to convince himself that this is indeed some sort of burgeoning egalitarian utopia and not a fucking prison:
And I think he’s drawn to Six because 1.) he appears to genuinely enjoy his company at times, and 2.) deep down he admires his ability to resist but is also deeply envious of that ability and wants to bring him down to his own degraded level. Maybe if he can break Six, it’ll prove that no one can resist the Village indefinitely, and his own selling out was inevitable and not a choice he alone made out of selfishness and/or fear and/or vanity, in exchange for an ~exalted~ position, power over the other detainees, ect.
Everything that happens in "Once Upon a Time" confirms it for me. Even before they head down to the Embryo Room, Two is shown to be wreck because of all the pressure he’s under to break into the adamantine fortress of Six's mind. His charming, “good natured” dandy facade has fallen away by now to reveal a much more brooding character, struggling in vain to understand why Six cares so much about maintaining his personal integrity/identity, despite the physical and psychological violence he is threatened with and often receives for refusing to submit.
The Embryo Room is clearly the nuclear option here and Two chooses it, knowing it'll probably kill one of them - and I suspect that he knows exactly which one of them it'll kill. Midway through singing nursery rhymes to an age-regressing Six, he starts to scream the words at his sleeping form with barely-contained rage (the tone of his voice suggests that what he's actually saying is "FUCK YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU SO MUCH YOU STUBBORN ASSHOLE HOO BOY YOU REALLY SCREWED BOTH OF US NOW HUH". Basically.) He hates this place, he hates Six, and he hates himself.
Then once we reach the Embryo Room, it’s pretty much game over for Two: his own ego has been so compromised that he lacks the foundation to stand up to Six at ANY age in a battle of wills and ideals. In the role of the headmaster, his frustration with schoolboy Six's refusal to sell out a peer seems pretty genuine ("you're a fool!"). Of course, secure in his own identity, Six doesn't mind being called a fool, but boyyyyy, Two sure doesn't like to be labeled a rat 😬 Immediately he breaks character to express outrage at this epithet before just barely composing himself enough again to launch into a tirade about society + conforming + lone wolf bad + blah blah blah. It almost seems like he's arguing with some part of himself as much as he is with Six.
Later, when Six claims to know who Two really is - "a fool, an idiot" - the latter doesn't handle that well either, snarling that he'll kill Six. One day when I have it more together in my head, I'll write a post about the significance of killing, both figurative and literal in the Embryo Room, but for now I'll just say this: in the fencing scene, Six declines to kill a disarmed Two when offered the opportunity. Similarly, Two refuses to kill supine, handcuffed Six when offered. Now, I'm sure that's largely because if he killed Number One's prize pet, there'd be no question about his own fate, but I also believe it's an indicator that deep down this isn't who he is - he may have a sadistic side that his role as Number Two encourages, but clearly not sadistic and unfeeling enough for what the Village requires of its operatives.
By the end of the episode, Two's been brutalized into a babbling, pleading shell of his former self and then...🪦🪦🪦...until the next thing he knows, he's been revived at this absurd, cultic assembly to be tried before a bunch of self-important morons in cloaks. While he does initially try to keep up his usual facade in "Fall Out", it's clear that he's no longer afraid of this supposed authority and can no longer hide his contempt for both the Village and for himself. Honestly so proud of him when he takes his badge off and stands up to the figurative curtain that Number One cowers behind ❤️❤️❤️
And I've gone on long enough for tonight but yes for Leo McKern Number Two character arc!!!!!!
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